Matin Mavaddat - Understanding Security as a Systemic Concern: The Role of Anti-Requirements

Matin Mavaddat discusses his perspective on security as a systemic concern, developed from his background in requirements engineering and systems architecture. He introduces the concept of "anti-requirements" - defining what a system should not do - and distinguishes between "syntactic security" (addressing technical vulnerabilities that are always incorrect) and "semantic security" (context-dependent security emerging from system interactions). Mavaddat shares his perspective that security itself doesn't have independent existence but rather emerges from preventing undesirable states. The discussion concludes with practical implementation strategies, suggesting that while automated tools can handle syntactic security issues, organizations should focus more energy on semantic security by understanding business context and defining anti-requirements early in the development process.Today's episode is brought to you by Security Journey.About Security JourneyOur education platform teaches valuable secure coding skills based on real-world vulnerabilities and threats, including OWASP Top 10.→ Learn more about Security JourneyConnect with Matin Mavaddat:→ Matin's article: Reframing Security: Unveiling Power Anti-Requirements→ Systems Thinking for Curious Managers by Russell AckoffMentioned in this episode:→ Matin's article: Reframing Security: Unveiling Power Anti-Requirements→ Systems Thinking for Curious Managers by Russell Ackoff→ Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas Taleb→ The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb→ Nassim Taleb booksFollow the Application Security Podcast:➜ Home➜ X➜ LinkedIn➜ YouTube➜ Instagram➜ FacebookChapters:00:00 Meet Matin Mavaddat: Understanding Security as a Systemic Concern: The Role of Anti-Requirements01:48 So I'm excited to have Mateen join us here. And Mateen04:17 One, one follow-up question. I read the, the article that is10:38 Mateen, can I give you a quick example11:42 There like, what would you say14:20 I like that example. I'm just imagining a pile of parts20:59 There's independent choices that drive it, right25:33 I'm going to ask you what I think of as the29:48 I see the challenge here, Mateen, is people that aren't going33:29 Happens, here's another million-dollar question. I often think about, in the41:26 All right. Well, I think we gotta, we gotta move on47:41 Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I, I've read some of, uh, Taleb's